I have long wanted to visit Blickling Hall in Norfolk. Ellen visited many years ago, as part of her role at the Trust, a their textile conservation studio is based there. It was a brilliant day out, the drive there was beautiful and the hall looked stunning.
It was built in the early 1600s, and the house that it replaced was believed to be where Anne Bolyen was born. It is the most stunning piece of Jacobean architecture, and the ceilings are amazing. I have rarely seen such ornate ones in any of the Trust houses that I have visited, of particular note were the very large finials on the designs, the ones in the lounge were huge.
The library, in the bottom two photos, was one of the most ornate ceilings that I have ever seen, this was originally the Long Gallery, until the 1740s when it was remodelled.
Because of the royal connection there were some gorgeous portraits, again with such stunning lace details. There were portraits of Henry 8th and Elizabeth 1st, as well as some other Elizabethan nobles.
I was very interested in this one, of Anne of Denmark, many years ago Mum and I visited the castle where she was brought up when we went to Copenhagen. The castle was a very beautiful place but in quite a remote coastal location, and I remember wondering at the time what she felt about her marriage and moving to Scotland and England. She was the wife of King James 1st of England and mother of Charles 1st, and by all accounts led a very tumultuous life.
One of the things that I love about visiting historic places is how it allows me to fill in the gaps in my historical knowledge, and make connections between people and places. Anne appears to have no direct connection to Blickling, but no doubt the portrait was acquired for its own sake, as it is beautiful.
There were some lovely beds on display, this first one dates from the Jacobean period and is in beautiful condition, with the colours on the crewel work so vibrant.
This was a very unusual set of bed hangings, on a bed in the fashionable Chinese bedroom. It has a mixture of heraldry and embroidered flowers, and looks as if it may have been pieced together from separate components.
There was also a very impressive state bed, which has recently been extensively restored. It dates from the late 1700s, and has the heraldries of King George 1st, 2nd and 3rd.
There is no information that I can find about whether any of the kings ever slept in it, but I loved the information about where the component parts came from, taken from this link at The National Trust collections site.
‘The tester and headboard (which bear the Royal Arms as used 1714 – 1800) are said to have been made out of a canopy of state given to John Hobart, 2nd Earl of Buckinghamshire in 1762 on the occasion of his embassy to St. Petersburg whilst serving as envoy to the Russian Court, a post he held between 1762 and 1765. Throughout the eighteenth century, every British ambassador representing the monarch abroad was supplied by the government with a state canopy, a chair of state, a pair of portraits of the king and queen as well as an allowance for ambassadorial silver.‘
I love the idea of this textile travelling to Russia and back again and ending up in Norfolk!
As well as the very impressive beds there were many gorgeous pieces of hand worked textiles, such as this cushion, and the fire screen in the photo below. As always when I see pieces like this I think of the hours of work by someone in the house to make these items.
There was some active conservation work happening at the time with the cushions in the lounge. I do like the way that the Trust are making this work more explicit now, rather than closing houses for deep cleaning. I know it must make it more difficult to do all the necessary work, but I really love to see all this in action.
I have been doing a lot of deep cleaning myself, it’s amazing how dirty the house gets even when I’m not here. The cockroaches are partly to blame for that, did you know that they poo? It’s like little mouse droppings, so I have to have a good clean out of all of the cupboards whenever I return. Luckily I don’t have any precious textiles here that are at risk.
Mum and I have been out, making the most of having Katy here so we went for lunch at the beach, and then an exciting trip to the DIY shop to buy new taps for the bathroom sink 🙂 We are off out again to some of the gorgeous coastline today, then off to Cordoba next week for a little city visit as it is so long since I have been in a historic Spanish city 😉 I will back as soon as I can with more of Norfolk, until then, have fun, take care, stay safe and thanks for visiting.
Stitches of Time 